The picture, which centers around a blind boy who finds life renewal through the act of envisioning elaborate stories and telling them to his friends, succeeds in large part because director and co-screenwriter Cristiano Bortone refuses to get sentimental on us. Bortone also casts disarmingly sincere, non-professional child actors and then wisely doesn’t ask them to play cute or mug at the camera. As a result, “Rosso come il cielo” feels like an authentic slice of life and earns its happy ending.

The opening reels show how young Mirco (Luca Capriotti) loses his sight in an accident. He becomes sullen and withdrawn, eventually ending up in a school run by Catholic priests and nuns for the

visually impaired. At first, a rebellious Mirco doesn’t pay attention in class and ignores attempts by chubby classmate Felice (Simone Gulli) to befriend him.

But when teacher Don Giulio (Paolo Sassanelli, who co-wrote the screenplay) gives him a reel-to-reel tape recorder, Mirco

finds a purpose in life. Soon, he’s recording everyday sounds — the banging of a door, rain falling, the wind hitting a window —and cutting and splicing them into a spellbinding narrative of wizards and warriors.

Spirited and sighted neighborhood girl Francesca (Francesca Maturanza) becomes Mirco’s collaborator in the creation of their fantasyland from mundane sounds — and their finished tape captivates the entire school community of faculty, parents and students.

“Rosso come il cielo” deals with many of the same themes as “Pan’s Labyrinth” and “Bridge to Terabithia,” to name just two of the more recent movies about the transformative and redemptive powers of storytelling. But “Pan’s” is very nearly a surreal horror film, “Terabithia” an escapist, effects-filled child fantasy and “Rosso come il cielo” a work of realism with a touch of the magical at the very end.

That only goes to show that the premise of a character reawakening through the act of telling a story — while used plenty of times and weighed down by its own particular conventions — accommodates so many genres and moods.

What makes “Rosso come il cielo” stand out from the crowd and so much more powerful is that, according to an end title card, the real-life Mirco Mencacci works today in the film industry as a sound mixer and editor.

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